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*Opens up his copy of "Codex:Armagedon"*
Yep on page 14 there is a captain painted with dark brown skin colour. But there is also a tactical squad sergeant with white skin colour...

I painted all mine the way the 5th ed codex said to, Chaos Black with Red eyes. I caught a little flak in the comments on my Salamanders pictures here on Dakka saying I shouldn't have but I could care less. If you want them to be African black then paint them that way, if you want them to be radiated jet black then paint them that way. It doesn't matter it is your army, but officially according to GW they are jet black.

Ah, the question of the century

As far as I know, the black skin is a reaction from their enhanced genetics to adapting to different atmospheric conditions. There's a bit in one of the ultramarines novels about that particular 'organ'

So no, I don't believe they're 'black'

cadbren wrote:

KamikazeCanuck wrote:
Not ridiculus in its plausibility, ridiculus that instead of having Marines with naturally dark skin they are white and then get burned black. Why not just have Marines with naturally dark skin? What's wrong with that?

Who says there aren't marines with naturally dark skin? Skin colour is a result of melanin concentrations so it's possible that the gene seed causes any naturally dark skinned people to become lighter skinned, or albino like in the case of Raven Guard. The Emperor did not have dark skin and ultimately the gene seed comes from him, though there is no reason why a chapter couldn't have dark skin.

Uh there are many Black Space Marines. White Scars are Asian and Thousand Sons are Arab. Proving that it doesn't matter what colour the Emperor was.
My point is it would be nice if Salamanders were naturally Black instead burnt black basically for the exact reason KingCracker brought up. I think its basically racist for a legion to not be actually black but "Robert Downey jr. Black".

i personally always saw them as dark skin tone, racial features were irrleevnet in my mind.

i would also say using codex armegeddon as a guid ais dodgy as it wa sfor a while known as the racist dex as all salamaders were I3 to show how slow back people are. Or that was how one douchbag near me put it.

in my book it may irritate poeple but i've always stuck with the paint em how you want school of thought..

Sgt.Roadkill wrote:i personally always saw them as dark skin tone, racial features were irrleevnet in my mind.

i would also say using codex armegeddon as a guid ais dodgy as it wa sfor a while known as the racist dex as all salamaders were I3 to show how slow back people are. Or that was how one douchbag near me put it.

in my book it may irritate poeple but i've always stuck with the paint em how you want school of thought..

ugh. Yeah, cuz there's no black people with sprinting records.

Considering that the Blood Angels seem to be all based off of Latin names, the Ultramarines based off of Greek, the White scars based off of the mongols, the black templars based off... the knights templar, the Imperial Fists off the Spartans, the Dark Angels off the medieval English, and the Crimson Fists off the Goths (the historical people not the douches in Hot Topic) I'd say that they've been going out of their way to have a wide range of historical and ethnic groups to chose from. Admittedly most of them are Mediterranean lose allegory for prominent armies and societies that existed between the classical era and the fall of the byzantine empire but I'd hardly call the race card on them for that.

Its hardly like there aren't numerous examples of various ethnic groups in the 40k universe. The Catachans, the Mericans, the Elysians, the Tallarans, and the Steel Legion all have featured peoples of various ethnic origins at some point or another.

KamikazeCanuck wrote:

Sgt.Roadkill wrote:i personally always saw them as dark skin tone, racial features were irrleevnet in my mind.

i would also say using codex armegeddon as a guid ais dodgy as it wa sfor a while known as the racist dex as all salamaders were I3 to show how slow back people are. Or that was how one douchbag near me put it.

in my book it may irritate poeple but i've always stuck with the paint em how you want school of thought..

ugh. Yeah, cuz there's no black people with sprinting records.

speed =/= initiative

Or you're stretching to fit racial stereotypes to a factual tidbit they put in the fluff to explain high gravity/low gravity environment's effects on muscles.